Is this a great time for our country......or what!

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I find it utterly baffling that people who think everything is great just can't understand people who think everything is shit, and vice versa. Does one really have to be a scientist to be able to know the difference between a firmly-held belief and a fact?

Personally, son of son of big ears means nothing to me, but I don't begrudge the pleasure the birth of Prince George is giving to some folk. Unless, of course, they seek to deny me something else as a punishment for my failure to, well, be exactly like them.

I predict lots more shouting on here today, and a few flounces.

One comment about poverty: If you define poverty as below a certain percentage of average income, then the proportion of the population in poverty will always be the same. The only way to change this would be to change the nature of the distribution from, e.g., Gaussian to skewed (it is already skewed, so from skewed one way to skewed the other). Also, the proportion of folk earning 'less than X% of the average' depends on whether you define the average as the mean, the median or the mode. In maths it is perfectly legitimate to choose any of them. But if you change your definition of average, or argue with someone using a different definition, the 'statistics' change.

Anyway - remove scales from eyes - anyone who thinks that on average (mean, median or mode) people don't live longer, have more holidays and more choice and more freedom now than say 20 years ago (and let's not forget - smell better) is living in a state of egregious self-delusion, probably with some sort of messiah complex. That doesn't mean we should be complacent however. But when it really turns to bollox it will be obvious to all.

While a have some sympathy with the idea of reducing inequality (although only some - inequality of possessions drives ambition; inequality of reward for the same work is mostly illegal), I get very annoyed with people who try to tell me that 30% (or whatever) of kids are in poverty and it is getting worse, based on normative definitions of poverty. Like the income tax debate the other day, people construct elegant arguments based on utter fundamental misunderstandings of the basic facts and how numbers work. But . . . I guess that's half the fun of it ;-)

 

[Kosmonaut]

One thing to add, statistically, is that crime is at an all time low in Britain: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk-news/2013/jul/18/crime-survey-fall-england-wales

 

[hybrid_x]

 

[Pavilionaire]

austerity.
nhs sold off.
post office sold off.
teen alcoholism and single mums at all time high.
gap between rich and poor at all time high.
class system now mutli layered.


.....sport and royal nonsense has a "feel good factor".....hence why used so much as a distraction.....

Top whingeing! Reminds me of my favourite Jewish joke:

Jacob and Nathaniel are walking down the road when Nathaniel finds an unopened wage packet. Jacob exclaims: "You lucky schmuck!" to which Nathaniel replies "Lucky? Lucky?!? Look at the TAX I'm paying!"

 

[stripeyshark]

What might be right for you, may not be right for some.

Judging by your posts on this thread, I assume you mean happiness?

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Britain ain't Great, but it is better than most anywhere else in the world. Moan if you want but whatever you pick to complain about, it will be worse elsewhere.

Probably true. I bet you could pick any time in any century and you could list a load of things wrong or unfair for some. It's all subjective anyway.

 

[Napper]

Seems a divide here of those who don't look beyond their own lives and those who see a bigger picture .

Selfish

 

[DavidinSouthampton]

There are 3.5 million children living in poverty in the UK today. That’s 27 per cent of children, or more than one in four.1
There are even more serious concentrations of child poverty at a local level: in 100 local wards, for example, between 50 and 70 per cent of children are growing up in poverty.2
Work does not provide a guaranteed route out of poverty in the UK. Two-thirds (66 per cent) of children growing up in poverty live in a family where at least one member works.3
People are poor for many reasons. But explanations which put poverty down to drug and alcohol dependency, family breakdown, poor parenting, or a culture of worklessness are not supported by the facts.4
Child poverty blights childhoods. Growing up in poverty means being cold, going hungry, not being able to join in activities with friends. For example, 61 per cent of families in the bottom income quintile would like, but cannot afford, to take their children on holiday for one week a year.5
Child poverty has long-lasting effects. By 16, children receiving free school meals achieve 1.7 grades lower at GCSE than their wealthier peers.6 Leaving school with fewer qualifications translates into lower earnings over the course of a working life.
Poverty is also related to more complicated health histories over the course of a lifetime, again influencing earnings as well as the overall quality – and indeed length - of life. Professionals live, on average, eight years longer than unskilled workers.7
Child poverty imposes costs on broader society – estimated to be at least £29 billion a year.8 Governments forgo prospective revenues as well as commit themselves to providing services in the future if they fail to address child poverty in the here and now.
Child poverty reduced dramatically between 1998/9-2011/12 when 1.1 million children were lifted out of poverty (BHC).9 This reduction is credited in large part to measures that increased the levels of lone parents working, as well as real and often significant increases in the level of benefits paid to families with children.
Under current government policies, child poverty is projected to rise from 2012/13 with an expected 600,000 more children living in poverty by 2015/16.10 This upward trend is expected to continue with 4.7 million children projected to be living in poverty by 2020.
At least this strangers baby won't have any trouble. Good times.

I appreciate all the sporting success, but wish I had said all this first.

As for the Royal Birth, I was most disappointed by the headline in the Guardian today: "Birth, Boy, Prince, King". Surely it should be more along the lines of "Another nail in the coffin of egalitarianism in the UK", or "Privilege through accident of birth rears its ugly head again". Does anybody know what the Socialist Worker's take on it all is.

I say this slightly tongue in cheek..... but only slightly. I have a 10 month old granddaughter, who matters just as much.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Seems a divide here of those who don't look beyond their own lives and those who see a bigger picture .

Selfish

Rubbish

 

[Brian Fantana]

post office sold off.

Without being too pedantic, it's the Royal Mail that's being sold - the Post Office is remaining nationalised.

 

[hybrid_x]

Without being too pedantic, it's the Royal Mail that's being sold - the Post Office is remaining nationalised.

yes, you are right, but you know what i meant.....but off of that we could add that The Post Office was recently cut back and centralised, ensuring many old people now have to walk a couple of miles.

 

[DavidinSouthampton]

austerity.

Economy improving thanks to current government, unlike most in Europe.
NHS spending at record high despite myth that it is being sold off.
P.O. being privatised to bring it in line with many foreign countries and make it fit for the 21st century.
Teen alcoholism and single mums due to lack of discipline and overgenerous welfare state. Punish drunken youths and make being an unmarried mum something to be ashamed of, not rewarded for.
Gap between rich and poor reducing I'm sure I heard on the radio the other day, but as a wise man once said "you don't make the poor rich by making the rich poor".
Class system's never seemed a matter of great importance to me.
Sport and royalty are facts of life so how are they"used as a distraction". Sport was huge in the former communist countries, was that to try and distract the population's thoughts from the fact they were truly enslaved? We, on the other hand, still live in a rather good country, despite the best efforts of the lefties to disparage and destroy it.


.....

Economy may be improving, but for the vast, vast majority of people, this is making no difference to them whatsoever. One could also say that the economy might have improved more quickly if it had been better handled.
There may be record amounts of money being spent on the Health Service, but the vast majority of health professionals don't like what is going on.... to say the least. Personally I have never thought that "market forces" should ever be allowed anywhere near health, education or things like the prison service.
Don't know enough about the Post office to comment authoritatively, but basically this will mean a diminution of the service.
On the drunken teens/single mums thing. I have some sympathy with the punish drunken youths thing, but it probably wouldn't work. Education would be far more effective. Maaybe we should introduce a minimum price for alcohol, except that the current Prime Minister is in the pocket of big business. And of course life as a single mum is a doddle. We have several in our road who drive Ferraris.
Gap between rich and poor reducing? I do not have the figures to hand, but WHAT PLANET ARE YOU ON!
As for the importance of the Class System, people look after their own. It is the single most corrosive aspect of our society today, which the current government is (deliberately?) seeking to promote through all aspects of its work, particularly education.
Sport and Royalty are a fact of life, yes. Sport was promoted by Communist States for the glorification of the state and to endeavour to show its superiority to the Free World. The RoyaL family are a fact of life, but I (like many others) would prefer that it was not.

In ancient Rome they had the concept of "Panem et Circenses", which means Bread and Circuses. In other words make sure the people are fed (even if it is through increasing use of food banks) and Keep them entertained and they won't bother about what else is going on. Although I would not see it as a deliberate policy, that is exactly where we are now.

 

[somerset]

Economy may be improving, but for the vast, vast majority of people, this is making no difference to them whatsoever.

Vast vast majority.... thanks for presuming on behalf of so many, a statement obviously plucked from the very thin air of your over active imagination......amazing.

 

[The Spanish]

View attachment 45064

thats brilliant they should make that a birthday card

 

[hybrid_x]

Economy may be improving, but......

THE Economy is getting worse by the day, research Quantitive Easing in the USA and in the UK then get back to me... (note, all world currency is linked to the dollar which is backed by nothing, and the FED need to plunge $80bn into the economy each month.....backed by nothing).

This week the FED said probably no tapering this year....e.g no reduction in QE......the media will however blab about manipulated job numbers and make everyone feel good - so people go and get loans and buy stuff.......helping their busted economy - which crashed and broke in 2008 - since then it has had plasters placed upon it.

check out "End of the Road, how money became worthless" - a film by ex Wall Street, finance, and gold experts who know what is coming.

 

[LargeHadronZugzwang]

The dilemma we face is that we have all been living like Persian Kings, people put oil in their cars and think it is going to last forever, what is more, they cannot name the largest oilfield which has been responsible for 1 barrel in 12 since 1950. Narry a clue. There has never been an energy source so energy dense, nor will another be found like it. Take everything out of 99% of households that does not come from this substance, or that was used to get it there and your house will be empty. Without energy there is NO economics. We can live without it but it is going to be very difficult, the caveat is, we cannot live without water.
The era we live in is now the end of cheap energy, the last of it is going to be increasingly expensive and environmentally damaging. The quicker we transform the economy into something else the better: this does not mean the Tory token wet blanket Gross National Happiness shite index either. It means an overhaul of a system mostly based on earning money for material possessions.

 

[DavidinSouthampton]

Vast vast majority.... thanks for presuming on behalf of so many, a statement obviously plucked from the very thin air of your over active imagination......amazing.

It seems to be what the majority of commentators are saying.
There are statistics around about the rich - i.e. the top 10% getting richer, while the rest of us - i.e. 90%, which is a fairly big majority - are getting poorer.
Admittedly the unemployment count went down - unexpectedly - this week - but how many of those are in marginal employment, part-time when they need to be full-time and so on and so forth.
How many people in real need , whom the Government of the Day would describe as "scroungers", are really frightened because they are GENUINELY unable to work, but are afraid they will have their benefits reduced. I heard of a case in Southampton last month of a man suffering from Emphesema and in a wheelchair who appealed against his loss of incapacity benefit. The effort of getting in to court in his wheelchair gave him a breathing crisis. By the time he had recovered his breath, his appeal had been upheld and the original judgement described as ridiculous. I was told of this by the person who was presenting the case to the tribunal, who has presented 12 such cases so far this financial year, 11 of which have been won, which shows the quality of the original judgements.

The thin air of my Imagination - I don't think so. Wake up and smell the coffee, as the expression goes.

Just as an aside, did you know that the amount of money committed to the bank bailout by the government would be enough to pay for JobSeeker's allowance at the current rate for the next 150 years, or is the equivalent of what would be lost through benefit fraud over the next millennium - that's one thousand years. And these are provable by Government statistics.

Amazing.

 

[glasfryn]

Of coarse things are OK
we have a new baby to faun over
Murray won Wimbledon
Albion are going into the PL
the poor get poorer
the rich get richer
shameron and gideon are smiling a lot
the rich stand on their garden walls pissing on the homeless
foodbanks are expanding
banks are also expanding
bank owners and management are also expanding
the old are struggling to heat themselves in the winter
but they can't take advantage of all the fecking hot air around
basically if you are old or poor or homeless you are fecked or totally forgotten






now where is that application form for my passport to cloud cuckoo land as it seems thats the place to be

 

[User removed 4]

I heard of a case in Southampton last month of a man suffering from Emphesema and in a wheelchair who appealed against his loss of incapacity benefit. The effort of getting in to court in his wheelchair gave him a breathing crisis. By the time he had recovered his breath, his appeal had been upheld and the original judgement described as ridiculous. I was told of this by the person who was presenting the case to the tribunal, who has presented 12 such cases so far this financial year, 11 of which have been won, which shows the quality of the original judgements.



Amazing.

So basically you're quoting hearsay ,and claiming it as prima facie evidence, yes ? Of the kind that would be dismissed as `typical daily mail stigmatising `were it a story about a single mother with 5 kids.

 

[glasfryn]

It seems to be what the majority of commentators are saying.
There are statistics around about the rich - i.e. the top 10% getting richer, while the rest of us - i.e. 90%, which is a fairly big majority - are getting poorer.
Admittedly the unemployment count went down - unexpectedly - this week - but how many of those are in marginal employment, part-time when they need to be full-time and so on and so forth.
How many people in real need , whom the Government of the Day would describe as "scroungers", are really frightened because they are GENUINELY unable to work, but are afraid they will have their benefits reduced. I heard of a case in Southampton last month of a man suffering from Emphesema and in a wheelchair who appealed against his loss of incapacity benefit. The effort of getting in to court in his wheelchair gave him a breathing crisis. By the time he had recovered his breath, his appeal had been upheld and the original judgement described as ridiculous. I was told of this by the person who was presenting the case to the tribunal, who has presented 12 such cases so far this financial year, 11 of which have been won, which shows the quality of the original judgements.

The thin air of my Imagination - I don't think so. Wake up and smell the coffee, as the expression goes.

Just as an aside, did you know that the amount of money committed to the bank bailout by the government would be enough to pay for JobSeeker's allowance at the current rate for the next 150 years, or is the equivalent of what would be lost through benefit fraud over the next millennium - that's one thousand years. And these are provable by Government statistics.

Amazing.

great,great post
my daughter lost her benefits for two years even though she had enough illness's to fill an A4 sheet.
she is now in the process of trying to retrieve some of them, fortunately she has a very understanding landlady.
I do wonder how many of those who think life is so great will wake up one day with a relative who needs care and have to take them in or sell their house to pay someone else to do it for them or have to watch them die because we have a government who will not cough up for the drugs to keep them going the same government who will not allow those people to quietly take their own lives with some assistance from their loved ones


live it up guys and girls .............while you have the chance